The First
by Yielding-for-Invisible-Cars
Summary: Hermione's thoughts and feelings as she travels through the rough road we call childhood. This is set in an Alternate Universe.


Hermione Granger sat in her pink and white lawn chair in her back yard, a large book propped in her lap, running her tongue thoughtfully over her buck teeth. It was a hot, muggy day in the summer between her eleventh and twelfth birthday, and she wished it was over.

Her hair, large and bushy, had been plaited by her mum, but it was starting to frizz. Badly. She shook the loose strands out of her eyes and gazed away from her book, out into the backyard of her neighbor's across the back fence. She shifted position when she realized that the man who lived there, bald and fat, was staring at her exposed legs, and drew her legs up. She retreated back into her book, unknowing of her father's glare out the kitchen's patio door that chased the faintly creepy man back into his house.

But Hermione saw none of this, absorbed as she was in her book. The old pages crinkled in her slightly sweaty grip, and as she read the small print she wiped her hands on her shorts, one after another.

"Hermione! Dinner!" her mother called, making the girl jump slightly and frown in annoyance.

"Just a moment, Mum," she said. "Just another page, I promise." Her mother smiled in amusement before shaking her head.

"Talk some sense into her, please," she asked her husband. "She'll get a sunburn out there."

But she would have none of it. Hermione was determined to enjoy every bit of tease-free sunshine she could, even if it meant not having dinner. Eventually, her dad brought her some melon on a plate, with a sly grin and a finger against his nose. She mimicked him, willing to keep the secret from her mum, and greedily ate, juice slipping down her chin and dripping on her shirt.

Her mum stood in the kitchen window, watching her husband and daughter talk about everything and nothing in the setting sun, munching away on the honey-dew she had just chopped. She smiled at the contentment that surrounded them, and proceeded to wash the dinner dishes. It was times like these that she absolutely adored her life, even if at first she was unwilling to have a child.

* * *

It was happening again, Hermione noticed. She glanced around herself, and then around her room, looking for something but not knowing what. The tickling, itchy, hot feeling under her skin was spreading from her stomach to her elbows and knees. She knew from experience that the strange feeling would soon spread to her face, hands and feet, making her teeth itch with the need to do _something_.

Her bed spread was neatly folded at the end of her bed, covered in books. Her pillows were strewn everywhere. Her door was shut, as were her windows. Carefully, as if moving too fast would upset the delicate balance she had on her body and that feeling, she crossed to her windows and shut the blinds, making her backyard neighbor curse as he got a telescope-full of curtains.

She tiptoed back to her desk, where she had been reading, and hauled herself into the too-large chair. The feeling was spreading, morphing into invisible hands. These hands kind of followed her directions, after some really heavy thought. Hermione was comfortable to just let these invisible hands do as they pleased, within reason.

Today, they decided to play with her pens that sat on her desk, clicking them together gently. She shrugged and went back to her book, able to concentrate now that the itchness was leaving her body.

Her mother went pale when she peered into her daughter's room, seeing her daughter read and her pens dancing around on the white wood with no help from the girl who was immersed in her book.

"It's happening again," she told her husband when she went back downstairs, who furrowed his brow in concern.

* * *

Hermione came home, silent tears coursing down her face as she clutched a book to her chest. Her father engulfed his little girl into his arms, frowning over the little red dots that decorated his daughter's arms and legs.

"Sweetie, what happened?"

She hiccuped before answering with, "Nothing."

"Surely there's something?" he pressed.

"Do you promise not to tell Mum?" she asked, her brown eyes wide. He nodded solemnly. "Some of my classmates found me in the park, in the tree that I like to read in. They made fun of me and called me mean names, and then they pinched me until I came home."

"Oh, sweetheart," he crooned, pulling her closer for a hug. "Did you do anything to them?"

"No," she said, burrowing her head into his shoulder. "Nothing. I didn't even correct their grammar."

"Then you did nothing wrong, and you have nothing to be ashamed of," he told her. Hermione nodded and pulled back slightly, a watery smiled plastered on her face.

* * *

**A/N: So, first chapter. First of all, I don't own any of this, not even the computer that this was typed on. Secondly, my grammar sucks. Thirdly, this is a teaser/test chapter. It's a plot bunny I've had for a while; Hermione's point of view of the seven years she was in school. It is AU, however, so if this continues she won't end up with Ron. Sorry for those of you who like that pairing. But if this story becomes a thing, you guys get to decide who she gets paired with, if she gets paired with anyone.**

**Anyway, if you want to see more of this, please please please review. It only takes a moment to type out, "Bro, go home. You don't have the slightest what you're doing, and your grammar sucks" or "OMG yes" or "This has already been done". In which case, I will take this down and go read the version that has already been posted. Unless I don't like the way it ends, or is typed or what have you. THEN I'll write my own, and maybe post it.**


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